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STATE CROSS COUNTRY: Marshall girls place in Top 10, Matzner finishes 89th at state meet

Photo by Jake Przytarski Marshall’s Jersey Leysen heads towards the finish line during the Class AA meet on Saturday. Leysen came in 22nd while the Tigers placed 10th as a team.

NORTHFIELD – A year ago, the Marshall girls cross country team, along with Zach Matzner on the boys side, qualified for the Class AA meet with the Tiger girls placing seventh and Matzner taking 89th. This time around, both the Marshall girls team and Matzner looked to improve those numbers at Saturday’s state meet on the campus of St. Olaf. Matzner showed his consistency in his second state appearance while the young Marshall girls squad had another strong outing with a Top 10 finish.

Marshall girls coach Marie Sample could not be prouder of how far her young team has come over the course of the season, and is already looking ahead to the bright future of the program.

“Boy they’ve come a long way since the beginning of the year,” said coach Sample. “A lot of new bodies, new faces. They had a lot to learn, some of them didn’t have a lot of running from summer and so they came in and did a lot of work in a very short period of time. They really dug in and really bought into the team aspect and I really like that about them. Because of that, I think that’s how they turned out as well as they did you know section champs, conference champs, we can’t complain about any of that. I’m excited for their future because everybody comes back next year and it’s really a promising future for them.”

Overall, the girls team finished 10th of the 16 teams, with three Tigers finishing in the Top 50. Leading the way was eighth grader Jersey Leysen who finished 22nd with a time of 18:48, followed by Bellamy Sukalski in 32nd with a time of 18:59 and Natalee Sample in 46th with a time of 19:14.

In spite of the tougher course, Natalee Sample was pleased with the way her team approached some of the more challenging conditions that they faced.

“I feel like overall our team did really well for the course and everything,” said Sample. “There are a couple of bigger hills, and I feel like our girls attacked them really well.”

Junior Kate Bucher, and seventh graders Allyson Sample, Cameen McFarquar and Gracelyn Foster rounded out the rest of the team with finishes of 75th (19:55) , 81st (20:11), 105th (21:06) and 106th (21:21), respectively.

On the boys side, Matzner was the lone representative for the Tigers for the second consecutive year. The junior finished in 89th place with a time of 16:44, and though he was disappointed to not reach his PR, Matzner was satisfied in knowing that he gave it all he’s got.

“My goal was to PR to get like 16:10 and it didn’t go exactly as planned, but I had fun,” said Matzner. “Another goal was to give it everything I’ve got, and I feel like I did that.”

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